Tunica Cutoff is slowly recovering from last year's record flooding

James Flack moves support blocks from a shed as he and Bobby Mayo (not shown) work last week to salvage a shed from Carol's Camp at the Tunica Cutoff. Flack and Mayo lost both their homes in the camp in last year's flooding.

Terry Bozeman attaches cedar planking last week to the back of J.T.'s Bait Shop & Grocery in Tunica Cutoff's Nel-Win section. The previous bait shop was lost to flooding.

Stan Carroll/The Commercial Appeal

James Flack moves support blocks from a shed as he and Bobby Mayo (not shown) work last week to salvage a shed from Carol's Camp at the Tunica Cutoff. Flack and Mayo lost both their homes in the camp in last year's flooding.

Just below, another plaque lists the joys of "Livin' At the Lake: Relax and Unwind ... Dance to a Song ... Watch the Sun Go Down ..."

Together, the two go a long way toward telling the story of many hardy souls living along the Mississippi River in Tunica County, where they constantly balance the pleasures of a lifestyle they love with the perils of living at the water's edge. Last year's record flooding -- beginning a year ago this month -- washed away home and livelihoods, but wasn't enough to keep many from coming back.

At 70, Smith is operating his fourth shop since coming to a rustic, remote and unprotected community on the river side of the levees in 1985.

J.T.'s Bait Shop & Grocery, in Tunica Cutoff's Nel-Win section, is a rebuilt, patchwork affair that sports an inviting, folksy porch. Yet, the shop perches on a trailer bed. Gone is Kingston's Landing, home of what had been the "Redneck Riviera Lounge" nearby.

"We had to put my shop on wheels," Smith said. "Our only other choice was to build it 'up' -- and I couldn't see a bait shop 16 feet in the air."

The river crested at 47.8 feet in the Tunica area last May, a 100-year event just below the 48-foot estimate. Cutoff residents, unprepared for such a flood, were ordered to evacuate. There was no loss of life -- but a way of life took a brutal beating that's only slowly recovering.

The rebound has been faster for Tunica's nine casinos, though business is still rebuilding there too.

During 2011, the state's casinos raked in $2.24 billion, down 6.3 percent from 2010 and the lowest amount since 1998. Analysts tied some of that slide to May's flooding, which temporarily closed many of the 19 river casinos, including all in Tunica.

"It's getting better; they're making a comeback," Larry Liddell, a Tunica County spokesman, said of the casinos that constitute the area's economic lifeblood.

R. Scott Barber, regional president of Caesars Entertainment Mid-South Region, said: "We're all very happy to report that Tunica's casinos are all back in business and have been operating under normal circumstances for more than 10 months."

Caesars operates Harrah's, Horseshoe and Tunica Roadhouse casinos.

"The flood exacerbated an already unfavorable economic climate for the Tunica gaming market, so we're all very glad to have that behind us as we look toward the future," Barber said.

The Cutoff was less lucky. Only five out of 350 Cutoff structures didn't flood, officials said. Some of the houses, spread across four "camps" that started as fishing outposts, flooded nearly to attic level despite perches atop posts on the banks of Tunica Lake.

County Planning Director Pepper Bradford reported that of 68 Nel-Win homes inspected, only four were found not to be substantially damaged. Other areas, especially Carol's Camp to the south, fared worse.

Before the flood, the Cutoff was home to roughly 225 households with permanent residences in the camps. Many, perhaps most, won't be rebuilding.

"I don't have a number, but it's a bunch who aren't coming back," Liddell said.

But amid empty lots and abandoned homes with red "Damage Notice" stickers, there's activity, he adds: "Residents are repairing, replacing and raising their buildings up like the law says. They're unique folks."

Smith puts it this way: "You really have to want to live here. You'll have trials and tribulations."

"But the good outweighs the bad," said neighbor Diane Austin. "We've got that lake view, even if we're the first to get hit (in a flood). People here really pulled together."

Most of the Cutoff's homes were built before new federal and county regulations. Any repairs or replacement of structures deemed substantially damaged must be in compliance with both the county floodplain ordinance and current building codes. That means dwellings must be raised.

The costs were too high for many residents.

"To raise a home is pretty dang expensive," Tunica Mayor Chuck Cariker said on a recent Cutoff visit.

But he added that while costs can range up to $2,000 a foot, some residents are moving ahead -- and up.

"You'll be amazed at how high some of these things are," he said, noting a new Nel-Win home rising on a wooden platform at least 20 feet above the ground. Many of Nel-Win's homes are individually owned, so there's more recovery activity here.

Smith said his home, just east of the bait shop, "only had 30 inches of water in it. I was able to make repairs" and keep it on its eight-foot base.

Neighbor Jim Clayton said his old residence, nine feet up, couldn't be saved, so he placed a trailer home he owned on a wooden frame built largely with FEMA aid.

"FEMA was a big help," Clayton said. "They did just what they said they'd do. About $30,000 was the limit in disaster assistance, and just about everybody got it.

"If it hadn't been for FEMA, we couldn't have done it."

By the end of May, Tunica County applicants to FEMA's Individuals and Households Program had received $129,277 out of $592,544 approved for 14 Mississippi counties declared disaster areas.

Doris Barringer, 69, who with husband Charlie owns and operates Charlie's Camp north of Nel-Win, was clearing debris from another now-empty rental lot. Her grown son and daughter live nearby.

"We're going to pour concrete if we can get the money to do it," she said, her border collie "Doolie" at her side.

"We had close to 70 people in here," Barringer said of the devastated camp of 46 acres. "Now there's only eight or 10 left. That's all. Most of them took their money from FEMA and took off."

As to their home, "we had 51/2 feet of water inside. We had to tear it down to the 2-by-4's and then wash it down with bleach -- and that was a feat. But we had to get rid of the mold; Charlie has problems with emphysema.

"We're going to flood again; we know that. But if it floods like it did last year, we're gone."

In the meantime, though, she noted an upside to last year's flooding.

"It's quieter now," she said. "The flood got rid of all the beer joints, so we don't have to worry about the noise."